


Edit Sober

by counterheist



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Being A Teenager With A Crush Is The Absolute Worst, Drinking Your Feelings, Embarrassment, M/M, Underage Drinking, Unrequited Crush, Viktor Stepping Up For His Son, Yuuri Doesn't Even
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-28
Updated: 2017-01-28
Packaged: 2018-09-20 04:44:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,257
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9476303
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/counterheist/pseuds/counterheist
Summary: Yuuri finds Yurio’s plisetsuki fanfiction. Viktor has a talk with Yurio, which consists mostly of a bottle of vodka and anI know, I know.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [cutthroatpixie](https://archiveofourown.org/users/cutthroatpixie/gifts).



> beta'd by [tom](http://archiveofourown.org/users/NotTheTomato/pseuds/NotTheTomato). the run on sentences and ridiculous commas are not her fault.
> 
>  **UPDATE:** BANNER MADE BY [DOMMIFIC](https://archiveofourown.org/users/dommific/pseuds/ken_ichijouji)!!!

Yuri Plisetsky’s life ends on a Thursday in April. He is not exaggerating, well, only a little, and that’s only because he does not actually die. That is a trivial detail. Every other part of his recollection is true.

The day is otherwise normal. He spends the morning at the rink with Yakov, tries to avoid throwing up or crashing to the ground every time he catches Viktor’s session with the katsudon out of the corner of his eye. His afternoon is spent in Lilia’s studio listening to her harp about the angle of his arms, and the stiffness of his legs, and beauty. She’s always harping at Yuri about beauty and strength, and he _gets_ it, but that doesn’t mean he needs her _shouting_ it at him every five minutes.

She compares his posture to the katsudon’s towards the end of the day, and that’s where things really begin to spiral out of control.

Because she compares him favorably.

Lilia Baranovskaya, who is internationally famous for being hard to please – infamous at Yakov’s rink for being _impossible_ to please – tells Yuri his posture is becoming as elegant as Vitya’s Yuuri. Yuri freezes. His hands twitch and he does a tour jeté, and then another, and then more, enough to take him across the room where the display of furious rage he makes at being compared to such a loser will be more believable.

“Whatever,” he mumbles after, for good measure.

When they get back to Lilia’s apartment that evening he rushes to lock himself in his room, and it is a common enough occurrence that Lilia doesn’t comment. She assumes he’s doing his schoolwork, because she knows he knows what will happen to him if he doesn’t. And he does do his schoolwork. But not until after he logs onto his Livejournal – his other Livejournal, the one he makes absolutely certain no one knows about – and sees that fucking tool THEREALnumberoneyuurifan has posted to the main Katsuki Yuuri fan community again. Yuri hates that guy, but they do share a common interest.

He clicks the Read More without looking at the header.

This was his main mistake, he admits to himself, after reading five out of twenty thousand words of THEREALnumberoneyuurifan’s ( _second_ ) Viktuuri manifesto. There is a long section in the middle of the manifesto dedicated to pictures of Katsuki Yuuri just looking at Viktor Nikiforov. Looking at him like he’s the only other person in the universe. Yuri is already crying, a little, at this point, but he saves the pictures anyway because he can always crop Viktor out of them later.

By the end of the manifesto Yuri is a mess.

He supports them. That is indisputable. Yuri Plisetsky will support Viktor and Yuuri until he dies, or until he kills them for being the worst, whichever comes first. But he’s still dying after reading a terribly-written block of text on their pure and beautiful love because he is also a teenager with a crush, and his life is nothing but terrible pain.

“Vitya’s Yuuri will be here in ten minutes,” Lilia calls through the door, and what she’s really saying is ‘you better have finished your homework, young man, or I will work you so hard in practice even the release of death will not be sweet enough for you.’

Yuri smears his fists across his face and tabs away to his French vocabulary preparation. He shoves his headphones tighter against his skull and listens to potential program music for next season. He could make his theme about yearning, he thinks as he furiously conjugates verbs. Yearning for the unattainable.

numberoneyuurifan does not leave a comment.

* * *

The only conversation Yuuri knows how to have with Lilia Baranovskaya is about ballet. He does not know if that makes her think he is simple, or if she approves of him not wasting her time with things she does not care about. Sitting awkwardly on a pristine white couch in her grand reception room, he clutches a matching bone china cup and saucer and tries to think of it like any other interview. It is uncomfortable but necessary, and even if he doesn’t do well he’ll still live through it. He tries to channel some of Viktor’s endless confidence. Fails.

“Yuri is not allowed to go out with friends until he has finished his schoolwork,” Lilia remarks. “And he has not yet finished his schoolwork.”

Yuuri nods, and stares down into the tea she offered him after it became apparent that Yurio wasn’t leaving his room any time soon. If he drinks it now he won’t fall asleep until dawn. He shouldn’t have accepted it, but here he is. “Schoolwork is very important,” he says mildly. “Minako-sensei always said that too.”

Lilia brightens just the slightest bit, and starts to tell him about the season Okukawa Minako received her Benois. It’s a topic Yuuri is happy to listen to, and does so for fifteen more minutes until he hears a door creak open and then shut again in the distance. He knows the disgruntled cadence of Yurio’s socked feet against polished wooden floors from their days training together, so he is already standing and ready by the time Yurio’s face appears at the other end of the room.

“Let’s go already,” Yurio says through a curtain of hair, as though Yuuri had been the one to keep him waiting.

“Hmm,” Yuuri agrees, as he waits for Yurio to slip on his shoes.

It is almost seven by the time they make it out onto the street. Usually Yurio finds his own way to their apartment, and he usually doesn’t tell them ahead of time. But Viktor swore up and down he was going to cook tonight as a present for how well they all did at Worlds, so an official time was set and Yuuri volunteered to gather Yurio from Madame Baranovskaya. If the delay gives Viktor the time to remember how terrible he is at cooking, order takeout, plate it on dishes that cost more individually than Yuuri’s computer, and dispose of the Styrofoam, well. Yuuri might love Viktor, but he also loves not having food poisoning.

Yurio hails them a taxi and buries his nose in his phone for the entire ride. Something is wrong, but Yuuri doesn’t know how to start asking. He never knows what to do to comfort other people, not that he knows how to comfort himself either, and he can almost see the storm clouds forming over Yurio’s head as they get closer and closer to Yuuri’s home.

“Ah,” Yuuri starts.

Yurio flicks a single, blisteringly cold eye towards him.

Yuuri pulls out his own phone. _i think yurios upset abt his brnz_ , he types.

 _SHARING A PODIUM W U IS AN HONOR IN ITSELF MY LOVE_ , Viktor sends back unreasonably quickly. Yuuri swears he keeps draft texts like that one stored and unsent just so he can fluster Yuuri at the worst times. _OUR SON WILL B FINE_.

 _unless theres a homecooked meal waiting 4 him_. Yuuri can’t stop his smile, imagines Viktor’s entirely undeserved wounded bluster.

Viktor is right, though. Whatever it is, Yurio is going to be fine.

* * *

“I married such a wonderful cook,” Yuuri says when they see the mouthwatering four course meal waiting for them on the little-used dining table. “How did I get so lucky.”

Behind him, Yurio flinches.

Yuuri doesn’t notice.

Viktor does.

* * *

Yuri’s last meal is a good one precisely because Viktor had it delivered from one of the best restaurants in Saint Petersburg, but he doesn’t know it’s his last meal until after they’ve each had their small sliver of chocolate cake, just barely drizzled in caramel, and Viktor has dozed off on the couch with Makkachin like the old man he is. In the kitchen behind him the katsudon clears away the remains of their meal and does the dishes. He taps Viktor’s sleeping head every time he passes between the table and the kitchen to pick up another plate, and Yuri shouldn’t watch but he can’t help himself.

He opens the godforsaken tumblr app on his phone. Pulling his knees up close to his body, he begins to type something to make him feel better directly into a draft post.

_Plisetsuki soulmate coffeeshop AU, PG, [RPF] // DON’T LIKE DON’T READ_

_Summary: Yuri’s words are ‘Welcome to Starbucks’._

Yuri busies himself with the act of forgetting. This is his second mistake, if anyone is keeping score, which he will be doing later in hell. The katsudon continues to bustle around him, tidying things that don’t need to be tidied, obviously concerned about something. Yuri bets it’s something Viktor did, that idiot. He makes a mental note to mention Yuuri’s ex-boyfriend and degenerate talentless street musician Viktor later on in the fic, to provide contrast to how good Yuri is for Yuuri.

He’s just describing the color of Yuuri’s heavy, hooded eyes after the big kiss scene when he hears a thump and the real katsudon drops a mug directly behind him. Yuri cranes his neck back until the hood of his sweater slips off his hair. The katsudon is there, pale, hand frozen in a grasping motion. His glasses have slipped down his nose to rest at the _exact_ angle needed to reflect the screen of Yuri’s phone back to his eyes.

 _‘You were always mine,’ Yuuri whispers, mouth lush and close to Yuri’s_ , Yuri reads even though it is small and upside down and backwards.

Over on the sofa, Viktor turns in his sleep. Makkachin whuffs. The katsudon’s mouth opens, then shuts, then opens again. Shuts. Opens. “Ah,” he says. “I’m…” His face flickers through too many emotions for Yuri to really pick out, but as soon as he recognizes pity he is done.

Yuri makes an executive decision on how the rest of this conversation will go, which is that it won’t. “Nope,” he says, shoving his phone deep into his jacket pocket as his soul leaves his body. “Nope, nope, nope, nope. Nope.” He doesn’t stop saying it until he’s out on the sidewalk below, ready to hail another cab, and that’s only because he refuses to look like an idiot who talks to himself in public.

* * *

That night as he's lying in bed staring at the fuzzy blob that is their ceiling, sleepy Yuuri Katsuki, JSF Certified Figure Skater, GPF Silver Medalist, World Figure Skating Championship Gold Medalist, turns to his husband and says, “I think our son is in love with me.” He waits a beat. Wrinkles his nose as he realizes what he actually said out loud. “…Yurio, I mean. Sorry. I think Yurio is.”

Next to him his husband Viktor Nikiforov, FFKKR Certified Figure Skater, Five Time GPF Gold Medalist, Many Time Many Other Competition Gold Medalist, Winningest Winner, carefully sets down his phone, levers himself up over Yuuri with one hand, puts his face down close, and says, “You think, huh?” Yuuri blinks up at him, and Viktor feels something approaching empathy begin to blossom out of the depths of his soul.

Because Viktor figured it out a _long_ time ago, thank you, that little Yuratchka is in love with his Yuuri. He realized it before Yurio did. Viktor is a pro at spotting people in love with Yuuri because he is a pro at loving Yuuri. When he sees Yuri Plisetsky at the training rink he sees a reflection of himself, and he knows what he looks like when he’s looking at Yuuri. He has a thousand Instagram selfies to use for reference if he ever needs to. He has a combined thirty-five thousand words of manifestos, including ten photosets, as proof if he ever needs the reassurance, which sometimes even he does. What did Viktor do in his last life that was so good that he deserves Yuuri in this one?

“I tried to talk to him,” Yuuri continues, blissfully unaware of his husband’s secret Livejournal shrine to him. “But he ran away.”

Viktor could hold himself up with one hand indefinitely, or he could at one point, but he chooses to place his other hand on the other side of Yuuri’s head and lean down onto his elbows. It brings his body even closer to Yuuri’s, which is always a plus. “You told him you care about him, but not like that?”

Yuuri snorts. “Of course not, I know that much.”

“Then…” Viktor pins his knees on either side of Yuuri’s thighs. “You told him you love him like a brother?” Yuuri rolls his eyes and reaches up to place his hand on Viktor’s bare chest. “A son?”

Yuuri’s light touch turns into a shove. “No!”

Viktor laughs as he rolls away and pulls Yuuri with him. They end up crosswise on the bed, legs tangled, Yuuri’s head on Viktor’s chest. Viktor knows Yuuri’s trying to have a serious conversation, but he can’t help himself. “Or did you say,” he tries to mimic Yuuri’s manner of speaking, knows it’s a botched job, “it’s nothing you did. I am just incapable of loving you?”

Yuuri groans at that one, low and scandalized. “At first I thought you were using old breakup lines, but I really hope you never said that to an actual person.”

“Ah ha, ha, of course not,” Viktor definitely lies.

“Viktor!”

Viktor pulls the edge of the blankets up over them, even though their position is odd and his foot is hanging off the side of the bed. They’ll readjust in their sleep. “I wasn’t a very kind person before I met you, Yuuri,” he murmurs down at the crown of Yuuri’s head.

“You still aren’t.”

Makkachin noses the door to their bedroom open and pads over to the bed. He’s a little slower to jump on it these days, and Viktor has been toying with the idea of buying a short set of stairs for him to ease the process of climbing up to sleep. Yuuri pats the empty space next to them, and Makkachin flops down on it easily. He’ll refuse to yield his half of the bed for the rest of the night, which is perfect as far as Viktor is concerned. He’ll take any excuse to keep Yuuri close.

“Then we match.”

* * *

On his run the next morning Viktor considers his options. He could leave the situation up to Yuuri, but that’s the fastest way to have it repressed and ignored. Plus, if Viktor has learned anything in the last year he’s learned that the only thing sulking produces is world record-setting men’s figure skating programs. Or perhaps that’s just him.

Sulking definitely doesn’t produce happiness on its own, though, so Viktor decides leaving the situation up to Yuuri is a no go. Yurio needs to be confronted, and Viktor is the only one of them with the complete lack of tact needed to do it.

He might not really understand exactly what Yurio is going through – when Viktor was sixteen his biggest problems involved Yakov refusing him ice time for practicing quads without permission and figuring out which model or actor or fellow skater to spend any given night with – but neither does Yurio, so he figures he can make it up as he goes along. And besides, like any other hot-blooded Russian man, Viktor understands the plight of love.

So he eggs Yurio on extra hard in practice that day so he can exhaust himself like a man, and then maybe he leaves an open flask of vodka – just a small one – on the bench in front of Yurio’s locker so Yurio can drink like a man, and then later he stops by Lilia’s place with takeout so Yurio can have incoherent cries and cuddles like a true Russian man. He texts Yuuri that he’ll be home late. Caps off his message with about two hundred kissy face emojis.

Yurio is lying face down on one of Lilia’s nice, ornate settees. It is definitely older than he is, probably older than him and Viktor combined. “I shouldn’t have written it,” he mumbles into the fabric, giving in much faster than Viktor expected him to. The wonders of dumplings and a few too many sips of Zhuravli, he supposes. “…in English.”

Viktor himself is sitting on the floor with his back to the settee, staring at the tablet propped up against a crystal vase on the low glass table in front of them. Lilia refused to allow a television anywhere but her kitchen, and her one requirement for him having an evening in with Yurio to ‘get that boy out of his funk, Vitya, _and if I find out you put him there_ …’ was that he was not allowed anywhere near the kitchen. So they are eating food neither of them cooked and streaming a hockey match on a tablet as an excuse not to look at each other. It’s all part of Viktor’s non-plan.

His pocket buzzes. Several seconds later it buzzes again.

Yuuri has sent back the face palm emoji. And then, _have fun on ur boys night out_. Viktor sighs to himself at his beautiful, ridiculous husband. Yuuri has to know where Viktor is and what he’s trying to do on some level, but even after a year of concentrated effort on Viktor’s part he still has a hard time understanding and believing that other people, so many other people, can look at him and _absolutely_ love him. He feels his fingers itching to write another Katsuki Yuuri appreciation post. Another time, he tells them, soon.

On the little tablet screen someone checks someone else into the boards. A third player gets punched in the face. Yurio snickers a little, and Viktor knows it’s time to put his phone away.

“I fell in love with the way he danced,” he starts, because someone has to, and they both know it’s not going to be Yurio. “Yura, did you know how many videos there are of his ballet performances on the internet?”

Yurio makes a noncommittal huff that Viktor takes as ‘yes, and I’ve seen each of them more times than you, you old fool.’

“It’s a lot,” Viktor continues. “He looks good in tights.”

On the tablet someone attempts a goal and gets highsticked in the face for his troubles. Viktor winces.

The game winds down towards the end of the second period, and Viktor wonders if Yurio cares about either of these teams. He himself always supports Saint Petersburg; if they’re not playing it’s whichever team is losing, but might pull off a last moment surprise victory. Viktor loves those kinds of things.

They watch the players skate back, and forth, and it’s the third period by the time Yurio says, quiet, “When he skates, and doesn’t think about anything but skating.”

He doesn’t explain, but Viktor knows exactly what he means. He pours them both another cup of vodka and raises a silent toast to a heartbreaker. Their heartbreaker. They watch the game end together, cheering all the goals and shouting useless advice, and then they put on another game and repeat.

* * *

A very loud, very unwelcome noise startles Yuuri awake at – he throws his hand in the direction of the bedside table, realizes he’s on Viktor’s side, rolls over to _his_ side, knocks his glasses onto the floor in search of his phone – four in the morning. He hears giggling and the noise, probably, of someone stumbling into every single piece of furniture between the apartment door and the bedroom. There’s a click, and then light floods its way underneath the bedroom door. That’s all the warning Yuuri has before the door bursts open and the full brightness of the living room lamps assault his eyes.

“Shut those off,” he grumbles, pulling a blanket over his head and turning towards Makkachin’s fluffy, sleeping form. He wonders how Makkachin is possibly still asleep. Practice, maybe.

His husband does not shut the lights off before he drags himself into their bedroom. Yuuri refuses to make space for him on the bed until the light goes away, and after a minute or two’s struggle Viktor relents and the darkness, blessedly, returns. When Viktor returns from the living room he plops himself down hard enough to make them both bounce on the mattress. At this, Makkachin finally wakes, whining and betrayed. Yuuri can relate.

“It’s going to be _oooooooookkkkkaaaayyyyy_ ,” Viktor whispers very loudly into Yuuri’s left ear, which Yuuri does not appreciate at all. Then he starts nibbling on Yuuri's neck and part of Yuuri could possibly be willing to wake up for this, Viktor drunk and silly and malleable in his arms. He reaches up to run his hand through his ridiculous, beautiful husband’s hair, feels the chill from outside still stuck on his skin, his coat.

Viktor’s still wearing his coat. He’s still wearing his shoes. He’s not wearing a shirt underneath his coat, but, Yuuri thinks to himself, he probably should be thankful Viktor’s wearing anything at all, what with the amount of alcohol rolling off his breath. Part of Yuuri wants to bundle Viktor up in a blanket and then into his arms – blanket first so Yuuri doesn’t get contact cold – but 95% of him is still whining and betrayed for being woken up at _four in the morning_ for anything other than a life or death emergency. Scooting just enough to the side that Viktor can lay fully on the bed and not sap all the warmth away from Yuuri’s pleasantly warm cocoon of comforters, Yuuri lets himself drift back to sleep.

* * *

Not that he’s conscious enough to realize it, but Viktor passes out around the same time.

He wakes up with Yuuri's frozen feet on his calves, and Makkachin flopped on his torso, crushing his lungs, and feels so. He feels so… _much_. Viktor can’t breathe fully and he has half a mind to retaliate with his own, definitely colder feet, and his body feels heavy, and his heart is so full he’s probably going to die from it any second now.

“G’ back sleep,” Yuuri murmurs in the predawn light filtering in past their admittedly flimsy linen drapes. “Don’ _dare_ put your feet on me.”

Viktor does as he’s told, but he also reaches over to grab onto some part of his husband, his arm, anything, to stop his body from flying away in pure bliss. He relaxes back into a lazy morning and dreams of nothing in particular.

The next time he wakes goes much differently for him. He can tell by the amount of light in the room that it’s much later than he usually wakes. For extra proof, even Yuuri is up and out of bed, and Yuuri only wakes without prompting when he absolutely has to. Viktor sits up, rolls his shoulders experimentally, and wishes his drunk self had remembered to take off his clothes before bed, or that his pre-drunk self had remembered to put on a less restrictive coat before going out.

He has a moment of peaceful regret before he realizes Yuuri isn’t in bed because he’s standing next to Viktor, arms crossed, phone dangling in his right hand. He does not look happy, but the late morning light hits the gold bands on his hand just _so_ , and it starts turning Viktor into so much mush. There is no expression at all on Yuuri’s carefully blank face. Viktor is probably in trouble and is probably going to get emotional whiplash, but he doesn’t care, revels in the sight of Yuuri’s wedding ring sitting above his engagement ring anyway.

Then Yuuri uncrosses his arms and it all gets so much louder.

“You got him _drunk_!” Yuuri screeches. “Viktor Nikiforov he is a _child_.”

“There’s no drinking age in Russia,” Viktor sniffs, wounded. His head hurts from transferred sadness more than the alcohol, and all he really wants is a hot mug of tea and maybe to spoon his husband for a few hours.

Yuuri kicks him off the bed. Viktor fell in love with those strong, muscular legs, so he only whines a little bit about spousal abuse. “That’s not the point!”

“What point?” Viktor asks their ceiling. He hears Makkachin eating his breakfast in the other room. At least Makkachin is distracted and doesn’t have to see his parents fighting. Viktor would never want that for his children. Speaking of Viktor’s children... “Oh. Yura.”

“ _Yes_ , Yura. Lilia called. She said Yurio hasn’t been able to keep anything but water down all morning.”

Viktor hums, realizes a few bars in that he’s humming the Japanese national anthem. Well. It’s a pretty melody. He wishes he heard it more often.

“ _Viktor_ ,” Yuuri sighs.

“He’s going to be fine,” Viktor says from his place on the floor. He might not have been like Yuri Plisetsky when he was sixteen, but at sixteen Yuri Plisetsky is a lot like him. “For both things. Our Yura is a strong one.”

Yuuri comes around the bed and sits on the floor next to Viktor. The wonderful feeling of too much from earlier is back, doubles when Yuuri lets Viktor pull him down to lie on the floor next to him. “I know that,” Yuuri says, intertwining the fingers of his left hand with Viktor’s right. “But I still worry.”

* * *

numberoneyuurifan finally does leave a comment on THEREALnumberoneyuurifan’s manifesto later that evening. It’s only one word and it lacks all of numberoneyuurifan’s usual vitriol and denials of the perfect and beautiful love Katsuki Yuuri and Viktor Nikiforov share.

It reads: _this_.

**Author's Note:**

> I just assume Russian fans continue, to this very day, to use livejournal. Because if it still exists someone has to be using it, right?
> 
> Also I could both talk forever and read forever about the adventures of numberoneyuurifan and THEREALnumberoneyuurifan.


End file.
